Las Vegas builders continue to see strong home sales

Las Vegas builders keep selling more houses and fetching higher prices compared to last year, and the strong demand should make a “smooth transition” into 2018, says a new report.

Builders closed 871 new-home sales in Clark County in November, putting the year’s total at 8,256. That’s up 14.3 percent from the same 11-month period last year, according to Home Builders Research.

The median sales price of November’s closings was $355,905, up 8 percent year-over-year.

Builders also pulled 769 new-home permits last month, bringing the year’s sum to 8,856, up 9.6 percent from the same period last year.

Contractors, lenders, title companies and other firms tied to Las Vegas’ homebuilding industry “should be very happy with this trend,” Home Builders Research founder Dennis Smith and President Andrew Smith wrote in the report.

Sales totals remain a fraction of their peaks, but homebuilders have been fetching record prices in Las Vegas this year, and the Smiths wrote that there is no good reason to think that prices will stop climbing in the near term.

As they described it, land prices aren’t falling, there is no sign of overbuilding, the inventory of resales is tight, and many homes on the market are priced too high.

There is still a problem with construction-labor shortages, an issue that could cause “more delays” in production and transactions next year, they wrote.

Las Vegas’ housing market is “still on the mend,” they said, but it’s “going in the right direction, and all things considered, is in pretty good shape going into 2018.”